If You Had a Time Machine, What Would Be Your First Investment?

Each week, we post a new question to the Best Ever Show Community on Facebook. The Best Ever Show Community is a place where real estate entrepreneurs of all stripes and sizes can come together to interact with each other, me, and the guests featured on my podcast with the purpose of everyone helping each other reach the next level in their businesses and their lives.

What better way to add value than to ask you, the community, for your Best Ever advice on a variety of different real estate topics. This week, the question was if you were starting real estate investing over again, what would be your first purchase?

The poll is closed, the responses are in and here are your answers:

Brandon Moryl

Brandon would acquire as many turnkey single-family residences as he could. In his market, Cincinnati, he can purchase a $100,000 turnkey SFR with $15,000 in out-of-pocket costs that rents for $1,250 per month. Great cash-on-cash return, longer tenants compared to multifamily, and easy to sell.

Harrison Liu

16 years ago, Harrison acquired his first investment – two triplexes situated right next to each other in a class C market. Today, the area is going through gentrification, so the rents have doubled and the property values have tripled. However, being in a C market, Harrison has had a few tenant issues over the years, including two evictions and being taken to small claims court.

Therefore, if he was starting over, he would have purchased a fourplex in a B location. Instead of two loans, he would have one. Also, he would have had access to higher quality renters, which means he likely wouldn’t have been taken to small claims court.

Ryan Murdock & Glen Sutherland

If they were starting over, Ryan and Glen would have purchased a three or four-unit property with an owner-occupied loan, living in one unit and renting out the others. Also known as housing hacking, they would have been able to acquire a rental property with little money out-of-pocket (generally 3.5% of the purchase price) and lived “rent free.”

Devin Elder & Whitney Sewell

Both Devin and Whitney said, if they were starting over, they would find a mentor.

Neil Henderson

Neil Henderson would have skipped over the single-family residence and smaller multifamily investments and went straight for a 100-unit apartment community.

Charlie Kao

When Charlie was starting out, he considered purchasing a condo from a bankrupt builder. Originally, the builder was offering the condos for $356,00 to $410,000. However, the people who agreed to purchase the condos couldn’t qualify for financing. So, the builder greatly reduced the sales prices.

Charlie was considering a 2-bedroom condo listed at $160,000. If he could go back, he would have purchased that condo, because today the current value exceeds $650,000.

Robert Lawry II

Robert kept it simple and humorous. If he was starting over, his first investment would have been business cards.

Make sure you join the Best Ever Community on Facebook. Check the group page every Wednesday and answer the weekly questions for an opportunity to be featured in next week’s blog post!

In the comment section, post what your first purchase would be if you were starting over again.